Xerox XA7-19i 8ms behaving strangely - washed-out display and artifacts

ajgoodfellow

ajgoodfellow

ajgoodfellow

Soldato
Joined
24 Dec 2004
Posts
11,364
Location
Knowle, Solihull, UK
Hi

Recently I've noticed that the quality of the display on my Xerox monitor has really gone downhill

It used to have a really vibrant display - one of the reasons why I was rather happy with it

Comparing it to the Digimate L-1916 I bought cheaply second hand it really pales in comparison. Everything is just very indistinct and washed-out, as if the Contrast and Colour controls have been turned down and the Brightness control turned up

I have spent many hours changing the Colour, Contrast and Brightness options to try and improve it but without any success. The best display seems to be at Contrast 100%, Brightness 100%, Red 50%, Green 50% and Blue 47%.

I've tried it on both Analogue and Digital inputs (it was far worse on the Analogue input) and off two graphics cards - a PCI 9250 and an AGP X800Pro. I've tried the Digimate monitor on both the Analogue and Digital outputs and it's consistently given a better display. The Digimate screen is far brighter at Brightness 40%, Contrast 40%, Colour temp 6500K

It also has another really bizzarre problem that I just cannot explain. When playing Half Life 2 I get artifacts on the screen after 10 minutes of playing. I occasionally get corrupt tool tips in windows. I assumed that the card was on its way out or its a driver problem - tried Cats 5.12, 5.13 and 6.1 with the same effects. It can run other games without a problem, and GPU temps never rise about 54 degrees C on full load (fitted with a Zalman cooler)

I tried playing Half Life 2 on the Digimate screen - played for about an hour without any artifacts.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

Many thanks
 
Hi

I've had it for about 6 months - I bought it in August when they first went onto the site

At the moment I've got it completely maxxed out, Brightness at 100%, Contrast at 100%, Red 50%, Green 50% and Blue 47%. When I first got it I had Brightness at 100%, Contrast at 50% and all of the rest at default

It's just really wierd. It used to have really vibrant colours and it seems to have lost this. Really can't explain it, particuarly as I've tried different graphics cards. Perhaps it is a cable problem, but as the cable is built into the unit I'm not sure

Might have to phone Xerox on Monday - see what they say. I've got one without dust under the screen, dead pixels, stuck pixels, or any imperfections. The backlight bleed is also non-existant. Hmm

The display looks overly green too.

Just tried setting it to defaults and trying your settings (just in case :) ) but it looks even worse.

I think it's been a slow thing as I haven't really noticed it but it struck me a few days ago that the colours weren't as vibrant as usual

EDIT: After some more tweaking it seems to be better at Contrast 100%, Brightness 8%, Red 52%, Green 49%, Blue 52%.
 
Last edited:
Hi

Just given them a try and they look awful on my screen! :) It makes it rather tricky to tell the difference between the border around the website address bar and the white bar itself, for example.

I haven't yet used any drivers - I tried the ones off the website (thanks for the link) but they don't work with Windows XP x64

It won't go into 75Hz via DVI at 1280x1024 for me

Thanks for your help BTW :)
 
Hi

Yeah - as you say it's interesting how people differ! I do wonder whether my monitor is working properly though as they're so different!

I seem to have got a slighly better display by changing the settings in the Control Center.

The monitor is set to:

Brightness: 0
Contrast: 100
Red: 52
Green: 49
Blue: 52

Under the Colour options in the Catalyst Control Centre, I've got it set to:

RED:

Gamma: 1.20
Brightness: 10
Contrast: 107

GREEN:

Gamma: 1.20
Brightness: -14
Contrast: 107

BLUE:

Gamma: 1.20
Brightness: 12
Contrast: 107

Under Video, I've got it set to:

Gamma: 0.85
Brightness: 0
Contrast: 100
Saturation: 112
Hue: 0.0


I really hate the Control Centre though. Very slow and buggy - as an example, if I have Media Player open and click on "3D" the entire machine crashes. It's a hard crash (music stops, keyboard doesn't respond etc) requiring a hard reset!
 
Hi

I've just tried reverting back to the Cat 5.11 drivers as these were the last release available with the Control Panel (against the Control Centre)

It actually looks a little better, although still not as good as it should be. The settings are now:

Brightness: 80
Contrast: 78
Red: 49
Green: 46
Blue: 49

The ATI settings are back to default.

Out of interest I tried Lost Coast again but it still artifacts. Whilst it was artifacting I swapped the monitors over and it still did it on the cheapo Digimate (as expected).

I've noticed another problem though. There is an ever so faint series of white lines at the top of the screen (about an inch down) and at the bottom. They were worse under different settings. You can only see them against certain colours too
 
Hi

Welcome to the forums :)

That was a common problem with the earlier examples of this monitor and it is dust stuck under the glass. Thankfully the front is relatively easy to remove - there are just a few screws on the back which you can take out and then the front comes off
 
Yeah, I do wonder about that, especially as it seems to have improved a little with the older drivers. It's funny that the other monitor is great though, and this one isn't that good on my other card which is also an ATI card!

I'm worried about the corruption - as you say that's what it's usually down to. It only happens in a few games at the moment but Lost Coast when maxxed probably really stresses the card. I really hope it's not on it's way out as it's only just under a year old and I've replaced the cooler. I can't afford to replace it!
 
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